Monday, 30 June 2014

A story is more than
stuff that happens to a person. And yet, if a friend were to tell you something
that happened to them at work or at school or wherever, you wouldn’t be
uninterested.

In fact, if it was
something amusing or surprising or touching in some way, it might even be quite
compelling. This incident might involve coincidence, luck, randomness and have no
real conclusion, but that won’t necessarily stop you hanging on every word.

However, put that
same story down in print, and it doesn’t have quite the same effect. Now it’s
contrived and pointless and banal.

Why? What makes
fiction—whether it be a short story or a novel—different from real life? And
how can we use this difference to help create more engaging and entertaining
stories?

On a superficial
level what books have that life doesn’t is a plot. Plot gives story structure.
A good plot gives it dramatic structure.

Life, too, can
sometimes have this kind of structure, but it tends to be more by luck than
design. That person you liked whose number you lost turns up at your sister’s
wedding. That football game you put a bet on seems to be a loss until the score
flips in the last five minutes.

Moments like these can
feel like they’re out of a movie, but once you start looking at how you got
there and where you go next it soon falls apart as far as storytelling goes.
Life rarely stays in story mode, there are just too many variables and too
many factors in play.

What the dramatic
structure of a fictional story gives you is more than one event after another;
it gives focus. In a fictional story there is a goal and there are obstacles.
Conflict and resolution and more conflict. So far, so like real life. But in
fiction all these elements, the big moments of drama and small moments of
quiet, all point towards the same objective.

This is not like
real life.

If I were to tell
you five interesting, cool or terrible things that happened to me over the last
few weeks, you would react to those incidents individually. If all those things
involved the same person form work, then a story starts to take shape. It’s the
streamlining of ideas into a single narrative that forms what we consider to be
a story.

But that isn’t
enough to make it a good story. There’s still something missing.

To be clear though,
the simple connecting of events in a cohesive and focused manner can be
intriguing and stimulating. Consider a game of chess.A protagonist and an antagonist. Conflict,
action and reaction, traps and gambits, misdirection and feints. All the
elements of plot, none of story. And yet if you are a fan, as engaging as any
book or movie.

In order to make
this more than a simple battle between two opponents, you can take a closer
look at the players, their background, the way they present themselves. I give
you the self-taught genius from the ghetto versus the Harvard-educated fop and
the chess board starts to take on a different dimension.

But it isn’t the
characters that are bringing the story out of what was pure plot, although they
are the vehicle for what I’m doing. What changes plot into story is the use of
values. By that I mean emotions, ethics, morals, beliefs and any other quality
that invites the reader to not just observe the action, as they would a game of
chess, but to judge what’s happening. Is this right? Would I do this? Will she
do what I want her to do in this situation? Why did she do that? Whose side am
I on?

It doesn’t matter
exactly what the question is or how the reader feels about it as long as they
feel something. Because as soon as they start questioning the choices made in the
story and themselves in relation to what’s happening, they are no longer treating
those fictional events as words on a page, they’re treating them as things that
actually happened. They’re treating them as real.

Here’s an example of
what I mean:

I bump into someone
I haven’t seen since my college days. I can’t remember his name, even though we
were close friends. The conversation is a minefield for me as I try to have a
friendly chat without giving away my faux pas.

The above is the
kind of thing that might happen in real life and which you might go home and
tell your significant other about.

Here’s a similar
incident with plot:

Jack bumps into Dave
who he hasn’t seen since college. Jack reminds Dave that he still owes him some
money which Dave was supposed to mail him but never did. Dave apologises but
has no cash on him right now. He asks for Jack’s address so he can send him the
money. Jack suggests they go the bank on the corner. Dave would but he’s late
for a meeting.

So lots of back and
forth that might end up going somewhere, but so far quire mechanical and
chess-like.

Okay, so now the
value-added version:

Jack bumps into old
college room-mate Dave and reminds him of the money he owes him. Dave doesn’t
know what Jack’s talking about and after a heated discussion he makes his
excuses and rushes off, leaving his coat behind. Jack picks up the coat to go
after Dave and feels a wallet in the pocket. In it there’s enough cash to pay
Jack back. He takes what’s owed him and hands the coat to the barman. He goes
home and tells his wife what happened. She remembers the incident (she went to
the same college), only it wasn’t Dave who owed him the money, it was his other
room-mate Andy. Jack realises he just robbed his old pal.

Now, the reason this
version is more of a story than the others isn’t simply because more happens (I
could have padded out the other versions to be the same length), it’s because
what Jack does and why he does it raises all sorts of ethical and moral
questions, and also evokes particular emotions. The anger at someone who refuse
to admit the truth, the self-righteous feeling of justice served, the shock and
embarrassment of realising you were in the wrong—all these sorts of feelings
invite you to judge your values against those of the characters in the story.

You may relate to
the character’s behaviour, you may consider him to be a terrible person, or you
may think it no big deal. It doesn’t really matter as long as you engage with
the story. Your involvement is enough to push you into the story world, after
that your involvement is the writer’s to lose.

How subtle or
blatant these values come across can vary greatly. Some writers are very keen
to make sure you know who’s in the right and who’s in the wrong. Other writers
can be quite vague and it can be hard to tell whether someone was justified in
their actions. But giving the story this added element can give you a better
idea of what kind of person your character is and give readers a stronger
connection to the story.

This is a terrific post! And it gives me hope about my current WIP. Now if I could only revise better, stronger, faster... I need to be the Bionic Reviser! "We have the technology. We can rebuild him." (Dang, I'm old...and weird) lol

I love this! Was thinking along these lines the other day as I finished a very good book - in contrast to another recently read book I didn't care for as much. I couldn't articulate exactly what the contrast was, but this sheds a great deal of light on it. Thanks so much for sharing your insight. You are an encouragement and inspiration. :)

I think books and the people that read them connect in the same way as technology and the people that use the gadgets. In Steve Jobs words, "People don't know what they want until you show it to them."

Great post and great comments. It is something to think about when writing...How to make this little piece affect readers the way it would if it were a story about their best friends or relatives. Hmmm.Deb@ http://debioneille.blogspot.com